Chapter Text
Lucifer cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled to be heard over all the noise.
“Lili!”
His voice might as well have disappeared in the crowd, and Lilith didn’t even answer.
Was she really here? Where all the bad people went?
Hell was hotter than he’d expected. He hadn’t known what to expect, actually, but it wasn’t pleasant down here at all. The air was stagnant and smelled like burning things. The buildings were tall and crammed together, forcing all the bodies close together as they moved along the dirty streets. Lucifer had to tuck his wings in just so he wasn’t taking up as much room.
He supposed it made sense in a way even he could understand. After all, unpleasant people went to an unpleasant place when they died. But what would Lilith be doing here?
“Lili!”
He yelled again and felt the sinners giving him looks of annoyance. But that wasn’t different from heaven, so he ignored it and focused instead on finding Lilith.
She wasn’t answering him, though. Maybe she didn’t remember that he used to call her Lili. He didn’t really know how long it had been. It felt like he hadn’t seen her in so long. But he couldn’t be sure. Time felt weird since his accident.
“Lil—!”
“Stuff it, half-pint.”
Someone shoved him roughly. He slammed into the nearest brick building, catching himself with his hands. Anger swelled in his belly, but before he could turn to tell that rude person off, something caught his eye. There was a poster, its surface both glossy and wrinkled, pinned to the wall. Lucifer couldn’t read the words (reading was hard ever since his accident) but he recognized the face on the poster.
“Lilith!”
He pulled the poster down. It tore around the edges. He promised to replace it when he found who it belonged to. That was definitely Lilith on the front. That was her face, that was her beautiful long hair. She was wearing a purple dress, which was new. (Last time he’d seen her, she hadn’t been wearing anything, just like Adam and ███. (Brain fritz. Name and face missing. Felt important. Probably wasn’t.))
Lilith looked very pretty in her purple dress. She also had two great, curving horns coming out of her head, which was also new. But this was definitely her. What was she doing on this poster?
People continued passing him on the street. He grabbed for the nearest passerby, a lanky person with spiky neon-green fur. The sinner jerked to a halt and looked down at him. Sometimes it was hard for Lucifer to read facial expressions, but he read this one loud and clear: Why are you bothering me? He was used to that in heaven a lot too.
“I, um…” he stammered, staring at the man’s sleeve clutched in his hand. He let go and held out the poster. “Please, can you help me? I’m looking for this person.”
The sinner’s eyes raked over the poster. “Lilith?” he scoffed. “Are you serious?”
Lucifer nodded. “Do you know her?” he asked hopefully.
“Lilith? The fucking Queen of Hell?”
“Oh,” Lucifer said. “She’s the—the queen?” He stared back down at the poster. “Since when?”
The man turned to face him, now sneering the way Adam did so often. “You must be new around here. You part of the recently deceased?”
“Me? No, I—”
“Nice hat, dipshit.” The sinner grabbed the brim of Lucifer’s hat and swept it off his head with a cruel, barking laugh.
Lucifer let out a startled cry and tried to snatch it back. “Give that back!”
The embers of anger in his gut flared hotter, even as the man’s laughter died away.
“Holy shit,” the sinner said, staring at him now. “Is that a fucking halo?”
Lucifer unleashed his wings to give himself enough lift to yank his hat out of the sinner’s unresisting hands. He pulled it back onto his head, and his halo settled back in around the brim. “You’re rude!” he cried. “Everyone here is very rude!”
The man was still staring at him, and now he could feel others staring too.
“It’s rude to stare!” he shouted, turning to them too.
“You’re an angel.” The lanky sinner who’d taken his hat put a hand on Lucifer’s chest and gave him a shove. It wasn’t a rough shove, more like he was testing to see if Lucifer was really there or not, but it ignited more anger in Lucifer’s gut all the same.
He swatted the sinner’s hand away. “Don’t touch me!”
“Is that a real angel?” someone in the crowd muttered, and Lucifer was aware a ring had formed around him.
“Why’s it so small?”
“Heh, kinda cute.”
A bulky fish-faced sinner covered in spikes pushed forward and planted his hand against the wall, right above Lucifer’s shoulder, hemming him in. He leered with an expression Lucifer didn’t understand. “You’re a long way from home. Isn’t someone missing you, sweetie?”
Lucifer looked away guiltily. He still had the poster of Lilith clutched in his hands. Michael wouldn’t like that he was down here. He said Lucifer shouldn’t be looking for Lilith. She was the reason for his accident, after all. The reason his brain didn’t work so well. But as much as Lucifer loved his brother, he missed Lilith. He missed her a lot. His memories were all fuzzy, but his feelings weren’t. And when he thought about Lilith, he felt happy. He’d just wanted to see her again. Just for a little bit.
“My name’s not sweetie,” he murmured.
“Yeah, okay. What is your name, doll?” A cold and scaly hand grabbed hold of Lucifer’s chin and forced his head up.
“L-Lucifer.”
“Mm.” The sinner’s fat lips split into a grin. He was smiling. He was happy. Lucifer thought. “Okay then, Lucifer, what’s a sweet thing like you doing here in hell?”
Lucifer held up the poster again, although he was beginning to think this had been a mistake, coming down here. Michael was right. Every time he tried to do anything on his own, without consulting anyone, it always went wrong.
“I just want to find Lilith. She’s—she’s my friend.”
A low snickering went up among the crowd. Lucifer watched them smirk and elbow each other, but he didn’t know what he’d said that was so funny.
“Well, she can’t be too close of a friend,” the fish sinner said, still with his hand on Lucifer’s chin. “Everyone in hell knows there’s nothing Queen Lilith hates more than angels.”
The sinner hadn’t slapped Lucifer. But it felt like he had.
“Wh-what?” Lucifer stammered. That wasn’t right. Lilith didn’t hate angels. She didn’t hate him.
Did she?
Was that why he hadn’t seen her in so long?
His hands holding the poster began to tremble.
“Aww, baby, don’t worry.” The sinner brushed one wet-cold thumb along Lucifer’s cheek. “I can be your friend instead.”
Lucifer shook his head, breaking free from the man’s hold. “You’re lying. You’re a—a liar! Everyone here is—awful!” He felt the glossy paper tear under his fingers. “You’re all awful! This is an awful place!”
The sinner’s smile fell away. “Yeah, you’re an angel all right.”
Lucifer let out a startled grunt as he was shoved roughly up against the wall, and the fish sinner was over him, much bigger than him.
“You think you’re better than us, huh? You think you can just come down here and do whatever you want, and we just gotta take it?”
The crowd around them was buzzing like a bunch of angry bees. Everywhere Lucifer looked, he saw unhappy faces.
“Arrogant little shits. Living up in the clouds while we all rot down here. Maybe someone outghta take you down a peg.”
Lucifer yelped when he felt someone grab at one of his wings. One of the other sinners. He quickly jerked away, but found himself pinned against the wall as other hands reached out for him. Tugging at his sleeves, the collar of his robe.
“What are you even doing here then, asshole?”
“You come down off your cloud just to rub it in our face? Hm?”
“Judgmental prick.”
Angry voices yelling. Yelling at him.
Always, people were yelling at him.“What have you done, Lucifer!? You’ve ruined everything!”
“Stop,” he said, curling in on himself. “Stop it!”
The big sinner pressed against him. “You a boy or a girl, sweetie? Gotta know if I should treat ya like a lady or not.”
A thick hand pawed at him between his legs, and Lucifer’s blood sizzled. Anger and panic mingled. No one was supposed to touch him there. No one besides Michael.
“Don’t touch me!” he screamed, throwing his arms out. There was a flash of light, silent and bathing the world in a luminous white, followed by the crack of thunder. The pavement under his feet buckled. There was a scream that almost immediately died away.
He’d only wanted the sinner’s hand gone. But when he cracked his eyes open, the entire sinner was gone. There was only a smoking shadow left where he’d been standing. The street and bricks had been bleached with holy light, and the smell of burning sulfur hung on the air.
Lucifer stared down at his hands, then up at the other sinners, who had taken a hasty step back from him. They were all staring back at him, and he couldn’t read the looks on their faces. He couldn’t tell if they were scared of him or angry with him.
“I—”
He didn’t get another word out before a loud scream rent the air.
As one, all the sinners turned and ran. There was more screaming, the scared kind, and lots of swearing. “Oh fuck, oh shit, don’t kill me, don’t kill me!” They were scrambling over each other, trampling each other. Red blood spattered on the ground.
Lucifer pressed himself back against the wall, squeezing his eyes closed. This had been a mistake. He never should have come down here. Michael was right. Michael was always right.
“Oh, mon petit ange, you have made quite the scene here.”
Lucifer’s eyes shot open at the unexpected voice next to him.
He spun, throwing up his hands to shield himself. But the sinner leaning over him didn’t try to touch him. Just smiled at him. It was a friendly sort of smile. Lucifer thought. He couldn’t be sure. The sinner was tall, with the ears and antlers of a deer, and his eyes were a bloody red, like the rest of him. Just like his red suit, which was tattered at the hem. He was the only one to approach him when all the others were tearing each other apart to run away, but he was smiling. Which meant he wasn’t angry at Lucifer. Which meant he didn’t want to hurt him.
Right?
“No worries,” the man said, in a voice that sounded all scratchy and grainy. “I mean you no harm, my good fellow.” That was good to confirm. “I believe we have a mutual friend, you and I.”
Lucifer sniffled and wiped at his eye. “We do?”
“Lilith.”
Lucifer lifted his head. “You know Lilith?”
The sinner’s smile became wider and tighter. “Indeed I do.” He held out a hand, tipped in sharp red claws. “I can take you to her.”
This was the most helpful anyone had been so far.
Lucifer started to reach out for the hand, but stopped. Something niggled at the back of his mind. Something Sera had told him about people with bad intentions.
He shook it off.
“Yes, please,” he said. “Take me to Lilith.”
As soon as their hands met, darkness swept in like a smothering blanket. It all happened in the blink of an eye. Lucifer’s vision went black, and when he sucked in a startled breath, it felt like he was drawing the darkness into his very lungs. The air was cold and heavy, but it only lasted a second. Barely any time for him to even wonder what was happening.
Because in the next instant, the shadows were parting. The heaviness receded, and it was only his own two feet on the ground again. The darkness drew back like a curtain, and the world was bathed in the soft glow of chandeliers overhead. The street was gone, along with the screaming of sinners and the foul stench on the air. He was standing on a marble floor, in a grand hall, with onyx pillars holding the ceiling high overhead. Lucifer had to crane his neck, and even then, he could not see where the vaulted arches even ended.
He was in a palace. And the sinner in red was standing next to him, gently pulling his hand from Lucifer’s. Lucifer fought the urge to snatch it back. That would be rude. But he didn’t know where he was. He hadn’t expected to be moved so quickly. He wanted to hold onto the one person who had been nice to him so far.
“Alastor.” A voice rang out, echoing off the pillars and floors. “What have you got there?”
The sinner stood with his back ramrod straight, arms tucked behind him. “Oh, nothing important. Just a little curiosity I picked up on the street.” Behind his monacle, his red eyes flashed. “A lost angel, I’m afraid.”
“An angel?” The air in the room suddenly grew heavy, like a brewing storm. “An angel!?”
The sound of clicking shoes reverberated off the marble. Lucifer saw a figure beginning to emerge from in between the pillars. Tall, with long hair billowed out behind them.
“Heaven would dare!?”
The voice sounded angry, and a quickly-becoming-fuzzy memory tickled Lucifer’s brain. “Everyone in hell knows there’s nothing Queen Lilith hates more than angels.” He found himself taking a step back.
“Who?” the voice bellowed. “Who would dare come uninvited into my domain!?”
The figure materialized out of the shadows, and suddenly she was there. Just as she had appeared on the poster. Dressed in elegant purple, curving horns, and just as beautiful as Lucifer remembered her.
Lucifer’s breath caught in his throat. “Lili.”
She stopped short. The click of her high-heeled shoes ceased. She stared at him. The slits of her pupils widened.
“Lili!” She was here! There was no other thought. Lucifer threw out his arms and his wings and flew at her.
She let out a soft oof as he collided with her, wrapping his arms around her neck and hugging her tight. Ah, she smelled so good. She smelled like water and summer, but with something darker underneath. She smelled like a very still, very deep, dark night.
He buried his face in her shoulder to relish in it. The memory of feelings flooded back. How happy he had always been with her. How badly he had missed her, all these years. How many years had it been?
She wasn’t as soft as he remembered, though. She was stiff, all rigid. She wasn’t hugging him back.
“Lu…”
“Lili,” he said. “I missed you so much.”
“Lu.” Her voice wasn’t loud and booming anymore. It was quiet and soft, barely a whisper in his ear. “Lu, you’re…”
“I came to see you!” He finally pulled back so he could see her face.
He couldn’t read her expression. She looked…worried? Upset?
He felt the smile dropping off of his face. Was she not happy to see him?
“Lu.” Her hands shot up and cupped his face, gently squeezing his cheeks. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see you,” he answered. “This nice man brought me here.”
He waved to the sinner in red, who waved back. Very nice indeed!
“I found him smiting sinners downtown, Your Majesty.”
“No!” Lucifer cried, suddenly remembering the sinner he’d vaporized. That had been bad. Really bad. “No, no! I didn’t—I didn’t mean to hurt anyone.” He turned back to Lilith. “I promise, I didn’t mean to. It’s just, they were crowding in and then they were touching me.” He shuddered, remembering their hands on him, and especially the hand between his legs.
“Touching you?” Lilith looked over his shoulder, to the sinner in red.
The man straightened the lapels of his suit, even though they looked pretty straight to Lucifer already. “They learned the hard way what happens when you lay a hand on an angel.”
“I’m fine,” Lucifer said, drawing her attention back. “I’m fine, Lili. I don’t want to think about them.” He didn’t. “You’re here!”
He looked around the room, with its pillars and chandeliers.
“Is this where you live, Lili? I overheard Sera and Adam talking, and they said you were here, in the place with all the bad people. I don’t think I was supposed to hear that. But I wanted to see you. I haven’t forgotten about you, Lili. I think about you all the time. I hope you haven’t forgotten about me. You do remember me, right?”
Lilith’s face softened. “Of course, Lu.” She knelt down. “You shouldn’t be here.”
His heart seized at her words. “I shouldn’t?”
“That was the deal, wasn’t it?” She ran a hand through his hair. “That you wouldn’t have to…”
“Have to what?”
“It’s my punishment,” she said. “Mine. Not yours.”
“Your punishment?” He frowned. “For what?” He grabbed hold of her shoulders. “I don’t—is it because of my accident? I don’t blame you, Lili.” He smiled to show her. Even if he didn’t really remember what she had done, he could never be mad at her. He had forgiven her a long time ago.
She didn’t smile back. She frowned harder. “Your accident?”
“You know—why I don’t think so well anymore. Why I’m—why I’m stupid.” He looked down, suddenly feeling ashamed. Most of the other angels were understanding. They weren’t mean to him because of it—well, except Adam. But it still felt like something shameful. He knew he wasn’t like he used to be.
He hadn’t ever been smart, but he’d been—he’d been able to think for himself, at least.
Lilith was still frowning. She looked…sad? Confused?
“It’s okay!” he hurried to assure her. “I don’t blame you! And anyway, Michael takes very good care of me.”
Lilith’s face shifted. It became…darker somehow. “Michael?”
“Yeah! He helps me so much. He helps me think and feel the right things. He’s very patient with me, Lili.”
“He helps you think and feel the right things?” Lilith’s hands on his shoulders tightened. “What things does he help you think?”
“Oh, just, you know, whenever I’m about to make a mistake. He corrects me.”
“He corrects you?”
“He’s very nice about it. Unless it’s something really bad. And even then, he always forgives me after.”
“After?” Lilith drew him in closer. “After what?”
“After he punishes me.”
Lilith was already very pale, but now it looked like all the color had gone from her face. Lucifer reached out to touch her. He wanted her to know that she shouldn’t be scared. Michael’s punishments were harsh sometimes, but they always passed. It was because he cared so much.
“He won’t punish you,” he assured her. “I’ll tell him not to. You haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Lucifer…” Lilith opened her mouth to say more, but in that moment, there was a bright flare of golden light.
The sinner in the red suit—who had been standing there watching them the entire time—jumped out of the way as a portal opened directly behind him. He just barely managed to avoid being trampled by none other than Michael himself emerging from the gateway.
Michael looked around the room of pillars, briefly looked at the sinner in red, then turned his gaze to Lucifer and Lilith. His eyes narrowed.
He was angry.
Lucifer couldn’t help himself. He clung tighter to Lilith.
“Michael.” Lilith rose to her feet. Her eyes were narrowed. She was angry as well. “Michael, what have you done to him?”
“It doesn’t concern you, witch.”
Michael strode forward, and Lilith moved to put herself in front of Lucifer, like a shield. “Don’t you hurt him,” she said, in the same bellowing voice she’d used earlier, before she’d recognized Lucifer. “Michael, I swear, if you lay one hand—”
“It. Doesn’t. Concern. You.” Every one of Michael’s word was a pointed spear. He grabbed Lilith by the shoulder and pried her away. “Witch.”
Her gave her a rough shove. She stumbled.
“Michael, stop!” Lucifer cried.
But the sinner in red was quickly by her side, steadying her. He must be a good friend of hers. He really was nice.
Lucifer didn’t have time to think about that, though, because then Michael was grabbing his wrist. “Lucifer,” he said dangerously. “What are you doing here?”
“I was—”
“We’re going home.” With a sharp yank, Michael began pulling Lucifer back towards the open portal.
“Stop!” Lilith cried. “Michael, don’t hurt him!”
Michael ignored her.
“Michael!”
“Forget what you’ve seen,” he said, not looking back at her. “Lucifer is not your concern. He never was.”
And then, just like that, he was jerking Lucifer through the portal.